Image courtesy of National Optical Astronomy Observatory, operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, under cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation.

Instructor’s Guide to Teaching SolidWorks Software Lesson 3

Troy Jr./Sr. High SchoolMcFall – Physics 3rd

October 18, 2011

2

Features and Commands

Base Feature The first feature that is created. The foundation of the part. The base feature geometry for the box is an extrusion. The extrusion is named Extrude1.

Tip: Keep the base feature simple.

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Sketch the 2D profile

To Create an Extruded Base Feature:

1. Select a sketch plane.

2. Sketch a 2D profile.

3. Extrude the sketch perpendicular to sketch plane.

Select the sketch plane

Extrude the sketch Resulting base feature

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Features Used to Build Tutor1

1.Base Extrude 2.Boss Extrude 3.Cut Extrude

4.Fillets 5.Shell

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Features Used to Build Tutor1

Extruded Boss Feature

– Adds material to the part.

– Requires a sketch.

Extruded Cut Feature

– Removes material from the part.

– Requires a sketch.

Fillet Feature

– Rounds the edges or faces of a part to a specified radius.

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Features Used to Build Tutor1

Shell Feature

– Removes material from the selected face.

– Creates a hollow block from a solid block.

– Very useful for thin-walled, plastic parts.

– You are required to specify a wall thickness when using the shell feature.

7

Magnify or reduce the view of a model in the graphics area.

Zoom to Fit – displays the part so that it fills the current window. Zoom to Area – zooms in on a portion of the view that you select

by dragging a bounding box. Zoom In/Out – drag the pointer upward to zoom in. Drag the

pointer downward to zoom out. Zoom to Selection – the view zooms so that the selected object

fills the window.

View Control

8

Display Modes

Illustrate the part in various display modes.

Wireframe Hidden lines Visible

Hidden LinesRemoved

ShadedShaded WithEdges

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Standard Views

IsometricView

Top View

Back View Left View Front View Right View

Bottom View

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View Orientation

Front

Right

Bottom

Isometric

Top Left Back

Normal To (selected plane or planar face)

Changes the view display to correspond to one of the standard view orientations.

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12

View Orientation

The views most commonly used to describe a part are:

– Top View– Front View– Right View– Isometric or

Trimetric View

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Default Planes

Default Planes– Front, Top, and Right

Correspond to the standard principle drawing views:– Front = Front or Back view

– Top = Top or Bottom view

– Right = Right or Left view

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Isometric View

Displays the part with height, width, and depth equally foreshortened.– Pictorial rather than orthographic.

– Shows all three dimensions – height, width, and depth.

– Easier to visualize than orthographic views.

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Section View

Displays the internal structure of a model.

Requires a section cutting plane.

Section PlaneMouse over

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The Status of a Sketch

Under defined– Additional dimensions or relations

are required.– Under defined sketch entities are blue (by default).

Fully defined– No additional dimensions or relationships

are required.– Fully defined sketch entities are black (by default).

Over defined– Contains conflicting dimensions or

relations, or both.– Over defined sketch entities are red (by default).

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Geometric Relations

Geometric relations are the rules that control the behavior of sketch geometry.

Geometric relations help capture design intent.

Example: The sketched circle is concentric with the circular edge of the extruded boss feature.

In a concentric relation, selected entities have the same center point.

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Geometric Relations

The SolidWorks default name for circular geometry is an Arc#.

SolidWorks treats circles as 360° arcs.